


RvB: State of the Union

by shockfactor



Series: State of the Union [1]
Category: Halo (Video Games) & Related Fandoms, Red vs. Blue
Genre: Alternate Continuity- Post-Shisno, Gen, Multi, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-22
Updated: 2020-07-22
Packaged: 2021-03-04 23:29:32
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,445
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25444696
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shockfactor/pseuds/shockfactor
Summary: Even with time set right, the past still comes back to haunt you.
Relationships: Agent Carolina & Agent Washington (Red vs. Blue)
Series: State of the Union [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1842952
Kudos: 14





	RvB: State of the Union

**Author's Note:**

> Seeing as RvB Zero looks like it'll be going in a new direction, I decided to have fun and try to exercise my writing muscles with something new that follows our favorite fuckups and Freelancers.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Carolina and Washington take time to decompress and process.

It still really hadn't sunk in.   
  
They'd fixed every paradox, every single one, and only just now had she put together what that meant for all of them. Specifically, her.   
  
Ever since the project had ended, the former Agent Carolina had busted her ass, fought herself half to death for _years_ trying to chase after Tex's ghost. And now, here she was, far removed from Freelancer, just Carolina. Well, she'd been 'just Carolina' for a little while now, but this was the first time that she'd really sat down and thought about the fact that she was just Carolina. 

She'd been sitting in the waiting area of the Doyle for a good forty-five minutes now. Evidently visitation was going to be an argument today. For the first time in a _very_ long time, she'd left her armor at home. Everyone seemed to be moving away from being suited up on Chorus, now. As if the fighting that had defined it, just like the fighting that had defined her, was finally over.   
  
Good.  
  
The wait had been uneventful, with Carolina staring out the nearest window for most of the time. There had been a brief moment where a guy in a tank top and jeans gave her a weird look, but that was about it for 'interesting' developments.   
  
"Yo."   
  
Her train of thought was interrupted by the ever-relaxed flat tone of Grif, who was also out of his armor for a change, the first time she'd seen him without his orange in... well, ever. Funny, she'd heard from Sarge once that the guy was morbidly obese, but it almost seemed like an exaggeration. The guy was _big_ , yeah, but not that big. He even looked like he'd bothered to freshen up- his hair was combed over neatly rather than left in a black-grey frizz, and his beard had been trimmed enough to look almost professional. He still reeked of cigarettes, though. 

"You look awfully nice," she noted, half-chuckling at her own little dig. 

"Yeah, well, they kicked me out the first time I came by. I apparently gave someone a 'secondhand stroke'." 

Carolina scoffed, rolling her eyes. "You're not nearly stroke level. The kind of stuff I've seen you do would have killed you if you were."  
  
"Not through lack of trying," he replied, slouching back in his seat. "How's Wash?"  
  
"He's been stable, up to now, and mostly lucid. He has some moments of... being _off_ , but they come and go. Doc says in another month or two he should be good to spend some time out and about, and he'll be fully recovered in four to six."   
  
"That's..." Grif paused, looking for the right words. "... _better_ than I was expecting. Good. Great. Awesome. How long have you been here?"  
  
"About fifty minutes."   
  
"Jeez, you'd think Grey would let you get away with shit more often."

"Well, from what I understand, she'd rather me not be there when he's having trouble. Not that I'd care, but, you know."   
  
"I can get that," Grif stated, his eyes focused on something else. "Say, what's the deal with that guy over there? The one in the white shirt."   
  
That was the same one that had given her the weird look earlier. Carolina looked and, sure enough, he was being questioned by one of the orderlies. He did _not_ seem to be happy, and stormed out of the building hurling obscenity at anyone and everyone he passed on the way out of the door... but not before looking specifically at Carolina. This time, she made an effort to remember his features. Black hair, buzzed short, green eyes, thin goatee, really sharp cheekbones, like a skull. If she saw him again, she'd be on her toes.

"Evidently, not a good day," she replied.

"You're telling me. Guy looked like he was going to kill somebody." Grif's gaze returned to Carolina, and evidently, she wasn't doing a good job of hiding her concern. "You okay, Carolina?"   
  
"Yeah, I'm fine. Just... worried about Wash," she lied. "I know he can get through this, he's done it before, but it doesn't make it any easier."

"I can imagine. Caboose was really upset yesterday because Wash apparently didn't remember him immediately. When he did, he kinda got pissed at him. I dunno why, probably brought up some bad memories. Tucker got really pissy about it, but he cooled off. Donut still hasn't come back from his little soul-searching journey, but I'm sure he'll be around sometime, at least to check in. Same with the rest, I guess."

Carolina nodded. "Right. Good to know everyone's alright, at least... what about you? Just checking in?"  
  
"Checking in on you, actually. Doubt anyone has," Grif stated, matter-of-fact. "Wash was always your babysitter."  
  
If this had been a year or two, she'd have probably hit him, but truth be told? He kinda had a point. Washington had found the Reds and Blues a good while before she did, and he'd adjusted to their new, wacky 'normal' far sooner than she did. He'd helped her along that road, tried his best to help her through to the other side of Project Freelancer, and now...  
  
Well, now they had _something_ , Wash had a hole in his neck, and Carolina was spending most of her waking hours in a hospital waiting room. Life throws you curveballs, her coming to appreciate Grif was one of the least surprising ones she'd received yet.  
  
"Guess so," she replied. "Well, you did it. I'm alright."  
  
"Yeah, well, maybe I wanna see Wash, too."  
  
"You don't."  
  
"You're right, I don't, I'm actually really fucking hungry. But I've finally settled into this chair, so I don't think I'm going anywhere for a while-"  
  
"Carolina!" came a voice from the other end of the waiting room. Dr. Grey's. "Come on back." 

"Well, I guess this is goodbye for now, Grif," Carolina said, slowly rising from her seat. "Tell the Reds I said hey."   
  
"Sure will."  
  
With that said and done, Carolina made her way to the front of the room, where Grey was waiting to lead her to Wash's wing. She could only hope for the best at this point.   
  


* * *

  
Wash felt, and looked, like absolute shit.   
  
Apparently, he'd been shot in the neck, and from what he could rather vaguely recall, Doc said something about blood flow to the brain being severed and memory loss, but that it could be a lot worse. That it _had_ been a lot worse. Wash hadn't immediately understood that, but Doc explained the recent events to him well enough that he could recall most of it when he was conscious. Now, he had pretty much everything all together. Apparently sometimes he'd forget and get a bit testy, but those weren't the most common incidences, and he hadn't had one since the first of the month so he didn't worry too much about it. He was more worried about what he saw in the mirror. He knew he'd been growing a beard on Chorus, but now it was just absurd, a thick, dark blonde bush that framed his jaw and made him look like a hobo. His hair was starting to get longer than he'd like, as well, losing most of its definition and falling into a mop. Sure, he wasn't military or Freelancer anymore, but he wanted to look presentable, goddammit.   
  
He had bigger things to worry about, though. Like the hole in his neck that had only just begun to fade into a scar, or the monitors and drips he was still hooked up to even after good five months of care, and Doc told him he still wasn't even over the hump yet. Fuck. At least the damn tube was out of his throat. That was some of the most violating shit he'd ever had to suffer through, and he'd had to suffer through some very, very deeply violating shit.   
  
He just wanted to be out of here. On his feet, so he could move on with his life. Maybe try and get that old cannon business back. Could he? Somehow, he doubted it worked like that.

Wash watched what looked like some kind of aircraft buzz by the window. It was moving awful slow, a lot slower than most air traffic, and for the life of him, Wash couldn't really identify just what it was before his attempt at amateur aircraft identification was interrupted by the door opening, a figure's reflection catching in the doorway, out of armor and out in the open.   
  
It was really, _really_ weird seeing everyone out of their armor during the day. Especially Carolina. Not that he minded seeing her without the armor. Seeing her, period.   
  
They had a lot to talk about.  
  
"Hey, Wash."  
  
He turned over, doing his best to mind the strings on his hospital gown and not bare his ass, or anything else, to his visitor. "Hey," he rasped, immediately regretting the decision to try and speak. "Damn, that hurts."  
  
"Then stop talking," she said, almost _motherly._ He could tell she wanted to talk, though.   
  
"I'll power through it," he replied. "How are you holding up?"  
  
"Fine. Grif says hello, by the way. He stopped by the lobby."  
  
"Really?" Wash couldn't help but be a bit surprised. The Reds didn't visit him nearly as often as Tucker and Caboose. Well, other than Donut. Donut came by surprisingly regularly. "Well, I say hi right back."   
  
Carolina smirked, and sat down in a rather uncomfortable looking chair in the corner of the room, dragging it over closer to him. "What about you? How are you doing?"  
  
"Getting better," he replied, even if he hardly felt it. "Just need to rest and wait for the rehabilitative phase."   
  
"Can't imagine that's any fun. We can't exactly just... _waltz_ back into the future and undo it, now, either." Carolina attempted to chuckle, though it rang hollow in the face of everything they'd been through. It wasn't easy to get near-fatally wounded as often as they had, and it fucked with Wash a little bit that he'd willingly done so that second time. Surely one paradox wouldn't have been the end of days, right?   
  
No. Never leave a job half-finished. He could recover from this.  
  
There was a long pause. Wash hadn't laughed at her 'joke', but he'd smiled, an attempt at making her feel less shitty about making it.   
  
"I'm thinking of settling down," Carolina stated, uncertainty creeping into her voice, as if she'd rehearsed the line a thousand times and was just getting stage fright at the last minute. "I've been looking at rebuilding the bases on Iris. When you're out, you should come see them."  
  
Wash was not the smartest person in the universe- this had been made clear to him on multiple occasions. However, he would have to be an idiot of the most extreme degree to not pick up what Carolina was putting down here.   
  
"I need to think about it," he replied. Truth be told, he'd rather have just said 'yes'. That being said, there was a difference between 'seeing' and _seeing,_ if he was reading into what Carolina was saying right. If this was a Carolina to Wash question, then he probably hurt her feelings. If this was a Carolina to David question, then... probably still hurt her feelings, but it was saving them both from an awkward fuckup that could be better addressed when he was fully able to talk. "I'm not saying no," he hastily tacked on, as if it needed to be said.  
  
Carolina smiled. "No, you're not." She seemed satisfied, turning towards the window he'd been looking through just a minute ago. "Anything interesting?"  
  
"Just air traffic," he replied, turning himself over so he could look back out the window. Notably, that unidentified aircraft from earlier was still sitting there, just... hovering. "Weird. You know what kind of flier that is?"  
  
"It's a Wasp, I think," Carolina said. "Not sure, though. Kimball gave me a couple of mothballed ones to keep in the hangars on Iris, for flying tours." 

"Nice."  
  
Wash turned to look at Carolina now, not terribly worried about the Wasp anymore. Just because he couldn't answer her question didn't mean she wouldn't be able to answer his, and as selfish as it seemed, he really, really needed to make sure he got his answered. There was a difference between saying something in the heat of the moment and meaning it, and he'd had a _lot_ of time to think. Well, whenever his memory worked, he could think about it, but that was besides the point. "Hey, uh, while I'm thinking about it... you remember, before the Labyrinth stuff, right? "  
  
Carolina's expression faltered slightly. "Yeah. I remember."   
  
"We, uh-"  
  
"Ding ding ding," came a call from the door. "Ding ding ding."  
  
Oh, son of a _bitch_.   
  
"Hey, Grif," Wash said, the pained rasp of his voice disguising the venom in those two syllables.   
  
"Yo, you can talk now. Sweet." Grif strolled into the room with a purpose, looking unusually clean. _Retirement_ retirement had done a number on old Dexter, it seemed. He immediately noted the withering look he got from Carolina, one that Wash couldn't even hope to match, but seemed to just regard it as another Carolina special and sat himself in the unoccupied visiting chair, by the door. "Did I interrupt something?"   
  
"Yes," Carolina and Wash answered in unison. 

"Oops. My bad. Sarge and Simmons are on the way with pizza, just figured I'd come let you guys know."  
  
Carolina scowled. "Grif, there's procedures to visit-"  
  
"Oh, I forgot, Donut's coming too."  
  
"Grif-"  
  
"Should I have invited the Blues? Fuck, I feel bad now, let me give them a ring-"  
  
"GRIF." Carolina raised her voice, stopping Grif in his verbal tracks and sending an involuntary chill down Wash's spine. Yep, there was the usual Carolina. "What do you mean, 'invite'? Did you..."  
  
"Yeah, I didn't feel like driving all the way back to the hotel. Everyone's coming here."  
  
"Grif, you _bastard_ ," Wash muttered, letting his head fall back onto his pillow. "We're not all gonna be able to fit in here."   
  
"It'll be a lot easier when we're not wearing armor," Grif replied. "Besides, you haven't seen us in months."  
  
"Each of you has visited me at least twice in the past four months."  
  
"Yeah, but we haven't all been here at the same time to properly thank you for selflessly volunteering yourself for an extra airhole to save the universe, so I'd like a 'thank you, Grif, you're a true friend, the best I could have ever asked for,' if you would be so kind."   
  
"Over my dead body." 


End file.
